Add Chicago Cubs pitching coach Chris Bosio to the list of team personnel who still believe Carlos Marmol should be closing games -- at least for now.

"It's the first game of the season," he said before the Cubs played the Pittsburgh Pirates on Wednesday. "I think it's magnified by the struggles he had last year."

There's little doubt Marmol's struggles are always magnified by his past. But Bosio is quick to point out Marmol's second half last season -- after early struggles -- was very good. He had 12 saves in 13 chances with a sparkling 1.52 ERA.

"How we got him on that roll was getting him back out there just like any other player," Bosio said. "Baseball is peaks and valleys."

Bosio and manager Dale Sveum agreed that Marmol simply struggled with his command in Monday's season opener when he walked one, hit a batter and gave up a base hit before being pulled. James Russell and Kyuji Fujikawa got the last two outs to preserve a 3-1 win for the Cubs. But not before Marmol made it interesting.

"It was a little chilly, for the players, especially, holding a baseball," Bosio said defending Marmol.

This is where Bosio's reasoning starts to break down. The Cubs sent four pitchers to the mound in the cold and three of them were great. Bosio tried to defend a poor end to spring training for Marmol as well.

"We saw a good stretch out of him, towards the end there were some defensive plays that could have been made but at the same time we wanted to see how he would handle it," Bosio said.